Capturing The Coment

March 2, 1986|By Joan Faulkner

Haley's comet has inspired a lot of strange art works over the centuries, but none more unusual than the one created by Winter Park artist Helene Staples.

After retiring seven years ago from her job as a home economics teacher at a private girls' school in Boston, she moved to Winter Park with her husband Elton. There, she had time to indulge her creative urges, one of which was to create scaled-down replicas of parts of the famed Bayeux Tapestry, which depicts the invasion of England by William the Conquerer in 1066.

The original tapestry, which is 230 feet long and 19 1/2 inches wide, could be thought of as a Middle Ages documentary or even as a super comic strip. One of the sections which Staples chose to copy shows excited English peasants looking at Haley's comet, apparently much more visible to the naked eye 920 years ago than it is now. ''The French,'' she explains, ''regarded the comet as a good omen, while the English feared it as a bad one.''

Staples admits that her fascination with the Bayeux Tapestry may have something to do with the fact that both her parents were French Huguenots, that she speaks the language fluently and had for some years organized and led tours of France and nearby Europe for the girls of her school.

She credits her husband, an artist and craftsman in his own right, with both help and moral support in what she does. For example, he carved the handsome rosewood top and bottom hangers for her first attempt at what is termed ''surface embroidery,'' a bell pull that won her a first prize in the crafts show of the Embroiders' Guild of America. Since then she has created many more prize winners.

But the Bayeux tapestry has a special place in Helene Staple's heart.

Although nobody knows just who or how many worked in it, ''I like to think,'' she says as she stitches away, ''that it was done in France by William the Conquerer's wife.''